Shine On You Crazy Diamond
by Mauve Alert
Summary: After Jaina goes insane, Kyp visits her in the mental ward. KJ songfic.


Disclaimer- Not mine.  Song not mine. Kyp not mine (unfortunately), Jaina not mine, sanity not mine.

A/N-  I had some success with this over at ((I'm SmugglerShidakis over there), so I decided to share.  ENJOY!

Shine On You Crazy Diamond

_**Remember when you were young,**_

_**You shone like the sun.**_

_**Shine on you crazy diamond. **_

_"Kyppie!" a young, giggly voice exclaimed. A wide grin spread across Kyp's face as he turned to see an energetic three-year-old charging at him. Her dark hair flew from its tie as she ran on pudgy legs, brown eyes bright._

_"Jaya!" he greeted, with equal excitement. The little girl launched into his waiting arms. Laughing, Kyp spun her around in a big bear hug. Jaina shrieked gleefully, arms wrapped tightly around his neck. _

_The little girl looked at him with an adoring face, and Kyp had to admit that the feeling was mutual. He was utterly bewitched by this beautiful little girl, full of life and energy. Who, inexplicably, was always overjoyed to see him. "Guess what!" she commanded him._

_"What?" Kyp asked. He smiled, and for once, his eyes no longer held that haunted, weary expression they had since his fall. _

_"Today's my Lifeday!" Jaina crowed, chocolate-brown orbs dancing. _

_"Really?" Kyp feigned surprise. "I didn't know that!"_

_Jaina laughed, a light, breezy sound. "It is! It's Jasa's, too," she confided, voice low. _

_"So it is. Twenty-five already, huh?" Kyp teased, just so he could see her bright, baby-tooth smile._

_"No!" she protested loudly, as if she'd caught a big mistake. "I'm three!" She looked up at his face. "You're silly!"_

_"Silly!" he gasped in mock astonishment. "Who, me?"_

_Jaina giggled. "Silly." she asserted. Smiling slyly, she inquired, "Do you have a present for me?"_

_"Hmmm...." He considered, then returned her smile. "I might have a little something...."_

_The little girl shone with delight._

_**Now there's a look in your eyes,**_

_**Like black holes in the sky.**_

_**Shine on you crazy diamond.**_

"Hi, Jaya," Kyp greeted quietly, slipping into Jaina's room. In one hand, he held a bunch of flowers; in the other, a wrapped present.

The short, thin young woman looked at him with vacant brown eyes. "Do I know you?" she asked, in a dreamy sort of voice. When Kyp didn't answer, she cooed, "Ooh! Flowers!" She snatched them and buried her face in the blossoms. "So pretty."

"They're your favorite type," Kyp told her.

Jaina looked at him as if he was something very curious. "Are they?" She inhaled again. "Why are you here?"

"It's your Lifeday." Kyp said, voice hitching. He remembered a time, so long ago, when this lost-looking woman was a whirlwind of energy and emotion. Pain welled in his chest to see her this way.

"Is it?" Jaina asked distractedly. Humming tunelessly, she scattered flowers about the bed and the room. Turning empty, bottomless eyes to Kyp, she inquired, "Who are you?"

_**You were caught on the crossfire**_

_**Of childhood and stardom,**_

_**Blown on the steel breeze.**_

_**Come on you target for faraway laughter,**_

_**Come on you stranger, you legend, you martyr, and shine!**_

_"Who's that, Mom?" the young boy asked, pointing at the face that filled the 'screen in the shop window. Kyp halted and listened to his mother's answer._

_"That's Jaina Solo, that's who that is," his plump, matronly mother answered matter-of-factly. "War hero, she was."_

_"Really?!" he breathed, awe in his voice. Kyp knew what he was imagining. Images of X-Wings and coralskippers, lightsabers and blasters and amphistaffs were running through his mind. All of the over glorified pictures of battle impressed upon young children. _

_"Oh, yes," his mother confirmed. "Poor thing. So young, you know. So bright. It's a shame, all right, a shame." She shook her head side to side with a _tsk

_Kyp's heart lurched, knowing what was coming next._

_"What's a shame?!" her boy demanded eagerly. "What?!" Curious as to this war hero, the brave warrior._

_"Why, she went crazy. Raving mad, she is. " Her tone was still informative, still clipped and factual._

_Her son sounded a bit disappointed when he next spoke. His dreams of glory and honor held no place for lunatics. "What happened?"_

_"Don't rightly know." The matron shrugged. "Lost too much in the war, perhaps. Too young to see that, is my guess. Poor thing." _

_"Oh." All interest in the subject lost, he shrugged and followed as his mother went on with her shopping._

_Kyp barely heard his muttered pronouncement. "Wacko."_

"Who are you?" she repeated. Brow creased in thought, she looked at him, confused.

"My name is Kyp," he answered. He offered her the present.

She reached out her hand as if to take it from him, but instead seized his left hand. Cold fingers played around his gold wedding band. "So pretty," she commented. Harsh light glinted off the ring, making it sparkle. The light illuminated golden hues in her irises. "Are you married?"

Kyp closed his eyes for just a moment, taking a calming breath. "Yes, I am."

"That's nice," Jaina announced. "She doesn't mind you coming here?"

"No, I don't believe she does."

"That's nice." With a thin hand, she pushed back her brown locks. "Who were you, again?"

His throat went dry, and he didn't trust himself to answer.

_**You reached for the secret too soon,**_

_**You cried for the moon.**_

_**Shine on you crazy diamond. **_

_"It's so close, Kyp," Jaina burst out suddenly. Her eyes gleamed eagerly. "I can almost feel it!"_

_Kyp turned a puzzled glance at his partner. "What do you mean? What's so close?"_

_"The Force, Kyp, the Unifying Force! What happened to Jacen when he battled Onimi!" she elaborated. She sounded so excited, he thought. Almost... greedy. "Perfect unity, perfect balance! I feel as if I could reach out my hand, and it's just beyond my grasp. I only need to stretch a little further, Kyp, just a little further!"_

_Fear clenched in his gut. "Don't, Jaina, it's dangerous, you'll get hurt..."_

_A flash of annoyance flicked across her features. "I won't. You worry too much, Kyp."_

_Punching out the keycode, Kyp slipped into their apartment, grocery bag held in his arm. Something felt... wrong. "Goddess!" he called, expecting Jaina to slip out of the bedroom to greet him. Instead, he heard wails and screams. Jaina's wails and screams. "Sweet Force, Jaina!" He dropped the groceries. A jar of jam fell to the floor with a crash and shattered. Kyp couldn't think. "Jaya, Jaya ..."_

_He burst through the bedroom door, to find her in a crumpled heap on the floor, screaming, "The moon! The moon! The moon!" She writhed in pain, clawing at her tear-streaked face, repeating over and over again, "The moon, the moon!"_

_Panicking, Kyp tried to take her into his arms, but she thrashed away. Desperate, he tried to comfort her through the Force. _

_He couldn't feel her. At all. She felt like... a Vong. Just an emptiness where her presence should have been. Hot, angry, worried tears burned his eyes. "Jaya ..." was all he could manage. As she screamed, he hurriedly placed a comm call to a med center, then fell next to her on the floor._

_She gave a last shriek of pain, and fell silent. Helpless, Kyp could only gather her limp form to his chest as he awaited the medics. _

_**Threatened by shadows at night,**_

_**And exposed in the light.**_

_**Shine on you crazy diamond.**_

_A young, pretty nurse popped into the room. "Visiting hours are over, Mr. Durron," she told him apologetically. He'd been there, holding his wife, for the better part of the day and well into the night._

_Desperately, Kyp besought, "Please. Can I just- stay, please?" He hated leaving her here, night after night, to suffer in the dark. "The doctors say she's having nightmares. Screaming in her sleep. Please." The woman bit her glossy lip, uncertain. _

_"I'm sorry, Mr. Durron-" she began, but Kyp cut her off._

_"Imagine it was your husband," he pleaded. _

_Torn in two, she looked down at the golden band that glittered on her own finger. For one horrible second, she thought of her own beloved husband, sitting here, confined, in a white room- No, she thought, shaking her head. She refused to think about that dreadful possibility. Instead, she regarded the thin, weary man in front of her, clinging desperately to his wife. Jaina was having one of her good days, it seemed. She was always more coherent when her husband came. There were some times, when he was away and unable to visit for days, she went completely crazed, weeping on the floor and babbling; repeating, over and over, 'the moon, the moon.'_

_When Mr. Durron came, she almost seemed normal._

_It broke her heart, to see this stricken man, coming day after day to be with the wife that would never again be in her right mind. That would never even recognize her devoted lover. And a tiny part of her wondered if her own husband would to the same for her. Indeed, if she would have the strength to do it for him._

_She saw how desperately Kyp needed her._

_Decision made at last, she smiled. "All right. Good night, Mr. Durron, Jaina."_

_Kyp was woken from an uneasy slumber on the narrow bed by screams. His eyes popped open to see Jaina's maddened, half-wild face looming directly above his. _

_"Moon!" she screeched, pointing out the window at the clear night skies. Hanging in the heavens were brilliant stars, scattered like gems on velvet, and the bright, luminous moon. Glowing silvery moonbeams filtered through the window, throwing flickering shadows across the walls. They seemed to move with minds of their own; the ghostly light made the painted slashes on the walls seem eerily alive. "Monsters!" Crystal droplets rolled down her cheeks as she rocked back and forth. "Monsters, monsters."_

_"Goddess." Kyp whispered his name for his wife, stricken. Remembering that horrible, horrible evening that he'd come home to find her losing her mind, he found himself similarly unable to help her. He was helpless, the feeling he loathed most, unable to save Jaina from the madness that plagued her. He quickly flipped the light switch, hoping to dispel the shadows that haunted her. _

_As the harsh light illuminated the room, and Jaina shrieked and hissed in pain. She looked, if possible, even more deranged in the full light. Her eyes were wild, darting to and fro. Like a trapped animal searching for a way out. Frizzy brown hair haloed her head in tangled disarray. _

_The sight of her rendered his already broken heart to shreds. _

_**Well you wore out your welcome**_

_**With random precision,**_

_**Rode on the steel breeze.**_

_**Come on you raver, you seer of visions,**_

_**Come on you painter, you piper, you prisoner, and shine!**_

Jaina seemed to have forgotten about Kyp's presence. Idly, she traced the splatters of dark paint slashed sloppily across the otherwise plain white walls. One rough, yellowish design, he realized, was a moon. A glowing full moon. It seemed to him ugly, ominous.

"Those are very pretty," Kyp commented, coming to stand beside her. "Did you paint them?" He already knew the answer; he'd been told by the doctor of her pleads for paint on days he was unable to come. He knew that, while watched carefully by nurses, she'd splattered and streaked seemingly random designs. Every time he came back after an absence for more than a day or two, he was greeted by a new design or scribble of meaningless words on the wall.

"Oh, yes," she agreed. She indicated a riot of neon-bright colors, squiggles and squirts and droplets. They were all bunched up in the middle, then fanned out, like a bright blossom. "It's like the dreams. The most beautiful dreams. So pretty."

"What about this one?" he asked, touching several vertical gray slashes.

Looking around like a child making sure no adults saw her raiding the cookie jar, she whispered, "Do you see them?"

Kyp frowned. "See what?"

"The bars." Frightened and nervous-looking, her voice was barely audible. "Bars, keeping me away from the moon."

_**Nobody knows where you are,**_

_**How near or how far.**_

_**Shine on you crazy diamond.**_

"_What happened?!" Kyp demanded, grabbing Cilghal by the shoulders. "What's wrong with her?!"_

_Cilghal sighed. "Sometimes, when a Jedi is in a dire situation, and suicide is the only way out," she began, "he or she opens their mind completely to the Force. You are aware of this?"_

"_Of course," he snapped impatiently._

"_It overloads their brains, like a computer being sent too much power, if you will. The result is death." With her large, protuberant eyes, she met Kyp's. "What happened to Jaina is similar." _

_Kyp could only stare at her, shocked, and remember. Remember Jaina's eager words to him about the unifying Force, the perfect balance. The horrible, mind-numbing truth hit him like a blow to the chest._

"_I do not know exactly how it happened," she continued. _I do, _Kyp thought. He knew what driven Jaina to do so dangerous, so stupid a thing. "The overload burned out some of the pathways of her brain. Irreparable brain damage."_

_Another blow. "Brain damage?" he repeated. "How bad?" He cast a worried glance at his wife, tossing and turning in her hospital bed._

_Cilghal shook her fishy head. "We won't know until she wakes up."_

"_Why can't I feel her through the Force?"_

"_I do not know." Cilghal's said sadly. _

_**Pile on many more layers**_

_**And I'll be joining you there.**_

_**Shine on you crazy diamond.**_

Kyp looked at her for a long moment. For four long months, he'd been visiting his wife regularly. Never before had she spoken of bars. Every time he came, she became more perplexing to him. "No," he answered. "I don't see them."

Nails digging into his bicep, Jaina clutched at his arm, eyes wide. "Shh." she shushed. "They'll hear you."

"Who?"

"The monsters," Jaina whispered. "The monsters behind the bars. You've got to be quiet, or they'll hear you. They get mad when they hear you."

"Jay, there aren't any monsters," he whispered back.

"Yes, there are!" she asserted. "They're right here, behind the bars with us."

He grasped her roughly by the shoulders. He couldn't take it anymore. Jaina wasn't supposed to be this babbling, raving madwoman. She was supposed to be the strong, clever flygirl, the Goddess he knew and loved. To hear her rant on about monsters and bars and the moon was more than he could handle.

"Jay," he repeated through clenched teeth, "there are no monsters."

"You're one of them, aren't you?!" she screamed. "No! Please! No! The moon! I just wanted to see it, to touch it, please! No! NO!" Thrashing in his grasp, Jaina shrieked in pain and terror, hollering pleas.

Disgusted with himself, Kyp released her. It was driving him mad, he realized. Seeing and hearing her like this. Through her insanity, his own mind was slowly being pushed to the brink.

He had to get out of there.

"I'm sorry," the young nurse apologized quietly. She was leading Kyp out of the ward, sensible shoes making no sound.

"For what?" he inquired.

"That you had to see that," she explained. "Jaina usually acts more normal when you visit."

Stopping abruptly, Kyp faced the nurse. "You mean that she's actually worse when I'm not around?"

The nurse blinked. "Yes. No one told you that?"

"No one," he confirmed. Tightly reining in his rage, Kyp kicked himself. All these months, he'd desperately wanted to bring her home, to care for her. Everyone told him that the ward was the best place for her, where she would be tended to; against his better judgment, he reluctantly agreed.

But she was worse when he wasn't there. Jaina needed him. Beneath the thumb of his clenched fist, he felt the gold band of his wedding ring. Wedding vows. He'd promised to love and to cherish, through life and death, through anything.

"I want to take her home." he announced to the nurse.

"What?! You want to check her out?!" the woman demanded. "Have you lost your mind?"

"I'll take care of her myself."

Lips pressed in a thin line, the nurse said, "Well, you'll have to talk to her doctor about that. Good day, Mr. Durron." She turned and began to walk away.

"I will!" Kyp shouted at her back. He was going to help her. He was going to save Jaina. He would.

Stalking down the hall, he saw, out of the corner of his eye, a tall, dark shape lingering in the shadows.

_**And we'll bask in the shadow**_

_**Of yesterday's triumph,**_

_**And sail on the steel breeze.**_

_**Come on you boy child,**_

_**You winner and loser,**_

_**Come on you miner for truth and delusion, and shine!**_


End file.
